A Gunman Rode North

'Now you listen to me!' snapped Judge Eaton, and leveled a forefinger at Harrow. 'If ever in this world any scoundrel deserves to be sent to the gallows, you are that scoundrel. Ever since I was appointed United States District Judge for this part of the territory, honest men, aware of Arizona's reputation for harboring more outlaws and wanted men than any other territory or state, have applauded my code of being ruthless with ruthless men like you, Mr. Harrow! They named me 'The Hanging Judge,' and I've let that reputation speak for itself.'

He paused, took a turn down the room to the fireplace and came back.

'I've known for a long time the sordid political conditions surrounding the Territorial Governor's office in Tucson. When I sentenced Lewis Kerrigan to life in prison at hard labor, I stipulated that he be sent not to the House of Correction at Detroit but to the territorial penitentiary at Yuma, the United States Government to pay for his keep. As such, the Governor of Arizona had no legal authority to 'parole' the prisoner into your custody. But he stretched a few points of law and took a bribe from you while I turned my back. I did so to put him into position for the criminal charges of malfeasance in office I shall make before next election. I'm sure he'll be quite anxious to withdraw from any race when I announce my own candidacy.'

Harrow rose to his feet, but he was unable to express the sudden astonishment in his eyes before Judge Eaton changed the subject abruptly.

'How broke are you, Tom? How much money have you got? Right now?'

'Very, very little,' Harrow admitted, and shook his head.

'How much?' snapped the judge.

'About six thousand in tiny gold bars hidden in Dalyville,' Tom Harrow answered desperately, somehow knowing it wasn't near enough. 'All that's left of ten thousand I had smelted to hand out as gifts to the right people. The Governor has one.'

'I want twenty-five thousand,' came the inexorable reply. 'I can't risk my whole carefully planned political goal upon the exigencies of your own desperate hopes. I've protected Pete Orr and the rest of the scum, but I need more money to campaign in threadbare clothes of a poorly paid man while I put out money to those who can help me. Well?'

It was Harrow's turn to pace to the end of the room. He came up by the huge fireplace, free of ashes and carefully swept clean, and rested his left elbow on the mantel near a picture of Joe Stovers' dead wife.

'I haven't got any more, Yeager,' he said low-voiced, and shook his head. 'It's all gone but that.'

'Very unfortunate, but I cannot run the risk of a loose tongue such as yours in the years to come, Tom. Not even in prison. I'm holding you for trial for complicity in the murder of the men Kerrigan killed.' It was tantamount to a death verdict.

'Wait!' cried Harrow, and again he was in the clutch of the old fear. He said desperately, 'I'll get you the money, Yeager!'

'When?' the judge asked and raised a dubious eyebrow and sniffed.

'Possibly within an hour. As soon as Kerrigan is out of Clara's house.'

'Do you think I'm child enough to believe she has such an amount, and you could secure it by bold robbery, and then I accept it from you?'

'I'm not speaking of Clara. Carlotta Wilkerson has the money. I gave her twenty thousand dollars when we became engaged. She has it with her now in goldback currency, over at Clara's house. If we can get Kerrigan out of there, I'll get it!'

'Hmmm,' the judge said briskly. 'This puts an entirely different complexion on matters. I am freeing you of all charges for lack of evidence. But to make certain of everything, I am removing Stovers as United States Marshal, filing charges of malfeasance in office against him for his conduct in the Kerrigan case, and issuing a court order restraining him from carrying out further official duties. I shall appoint Jeb Donnelly to take Stovers' place; and your other men as his deputies to help apprehend Kerrigan when he attempts to burn Dalyville, which probably will be tonight. You'll take him tomorrow and find your new source of renegade Apache gold, Tom. Then bring him back to me—in chains. As one of my last official acts before I resign office to take over complete political control of Arizona, I'm going to send Kerrigan to the gallows!'

'My God!' Tom Harrow whispered in soft amazement, staring at the man he'd known for more than two years, viewing him as a not-too-well-paid man content to accept; the money Harrow had paid him at regular intervals. He'd never dreamed that such thoughts had ever entered the bony, partly bald skull of the tall man in the threadbare coat.

He shook his head a couple of times as though to clear it. 'You in the Territorial Governor's office and me with a million dollars' worth of gold stocks in a new strike. Yeager, we'll own Arizona!'

'I'll own one half of your gold stocks by proxy,' the judge said matter-of-factly, and actually smiled. 'I'll want those men brought here to swear them in. Make certain they don't go near Clara's place until Kerrigan leaves. I wish it were time for supper,' he complained. 'I've suddenly a very healthy appetite for some more of Clara's fine cooking.'

CHAPTER TWELVE

Kerrigan finished eating the kind of meal he hadn't been used to in a long time, with smiling apologies to Clara for the amount of food consumed. By the time he finished, Clara Thompson had silently wrapped up a package of food to be taken to Kadoba, still under cover somewhere down in the old fort.

He and Clara were alone in the kitchen. She sat across the table from him now, her coffee unwanted and untasted. Both of them had the feeling that he was leaving for the last time.

'And you won't give up this mad idea of yours to ride to Dalyville tonight and burn it, Lew?'

He shook his head. 'No, Clara. The whole thing seems to be a blot on my soul—that is, if a man like me has one any more. Kitty will probably give you the details anyhow, so I might as well tell you that I came to Arizona in the first place with a changed name because circumstances made a Texas gun fighter out of me. I could have been contented over here. I could have forgot that your heart will always be buried over there in the cemetery; but I couldn't tell a woman like you, who'd been the wife of a fine officer, that there were five graves strung out behind me. That's what made it so easy when Kitty came along. But Tom Harrow played his cards the way he did, and now there's nothing left but to run for it again.'

'Tom is in jail, Lew,' she reminded him. 'I'm certain Joe Stovers and Judge Eaton can find something in the law to send him to prison and to vindicate you for what you had to do. This is all finished, if you'd let it be that way.'

He smiled at her and squashed out the butt of his cigarette in the saucer holding his coffee cup. 'I'm not afraid of what Jeb Donnelly will do now. But I am afraid of Ace Saunders. I know how a man like Ace thinks. I thought the same way when I trailed down the murderers who shot my mother. He's the man who'd have ridden in at a dead run and busted that war party of Apache bucks wide open long enough to get me out of there, simply because I was a white man. He saw me kill his best friend, but he waited here in the house to find out what I was going to do about Kitty's lack of faith. He'll never give up hunting me, and it's got to be settled before I go.'

Movement came from the parlor doorway and Carlotta came in from her lower floor room next to Clara's. She carried a small black valise in one hand. She placed it on the table before him and opened it.

She said simply, 'Lew, when I became engaged to Thomas, he gave me twenty thousand dollars in certificates. He was a very wealthy man, my future husband, and I accepted the money because I needed it. That money came from the diggings in Dalyville. The money is of no use to me any more, and I feel that it belongs to you. It's all here, a little over eighteen thousand dollars.'

He stared at her and then slowly shook his head, picking up, instead, the food package for Kadoba.

'You won't accept it?' she asked in surprise. 'But you'll need it for your defense.'

He shook his head again.

'Carlotta,' he smiled at her, 'Joe Stovers is holding all the money he received for my cattle, less five hundred dollars I want Kitty to have to go back East. He can send me the rest of it when I light again somewhere else.'

'Then you're not going after that Apache gold?'